Thursday, February 14, 2008

We recently covered an article on Free PBX systems, which became extremely popular among our visitors and have received extensive media coverage. Today, we discuss how a simple FREE auto attendant service can be used as an effective PBX system and at the same time, can make calls to any USA number for FREE.

Ring Branchis a new free PBX auto attendant and call forwarding service available to USA residents. What RingBranch simple does is they give you a free incoming number in USA which can be dialed

using any landline and mobile phone in USA or abroad. We will discuss a hack to use this from out of USA.

Let's first understand What's RingBranch, which could be used as a effective small business phone system

RingBranch is a Personal Auto-Attendant and Call-Connection service that overlays on to your existing phone service. Just pick up your phone, call your RingBranch number and be connected to your contacts. There is no special software to download. All you need is a phone and a dial tone to use RingBranch.

It's all vitually hosted and managed by RingBranch. The whole idea is in USA, many providers offer free calling minutes to 1-2 numbers per month. Till today, you were using that to make unlimited calls to only those numbers now with RingBranch you can multiply that and make calls to over 400 contacts using your mobile free inclusive minutes. It's a classic example of a FREE PBX system being used as free call forwarding system.

You just need to add your RingBranch number to your mobile plan under "unlimited call plan". You are done. Just hop over to RingBranch and setup your contact list.

To sum it up, RingBranch gives you following.

1) A geographic phone number in USA.2) You can add upto 3 numbers to call your auto-attendant. Your auto-attendent will only be reached via these 3 numbers.

How do you make free calls to usa?

Just dial your geographic number from your Phone (must be added in your account). The auto-attendant service will welcome you and ask to choose a contact from the contact list. Just select the contact and RingBranch will dial out to your friend for FREE.

Now you understood that you can make calls out to your friends in USA but how about they call you? Yes, even that's possible. You can give your RingBranch number to them and they can just dial that number. The call will be automatically forwarded to your Primary number set in your account. You can change your primary or secondary numbers from your account anytime you wish.

When your friends call your number, they don't get access to your auto-attendant. The auto-attendant service verifies Caller ID and its only available via 3 numbers setup in your account.

The best part of the service is, no special software to download. No complicated SIP/VOIP setups. It's as easy as signing up for a service.